The taxi dropped me off in front of my house and I got out, tipping the driver and getting my luggage out of the trunk.

"Thank you," I said, as she nodded and drove away. I turned around and looked up at the small two story ranch house I had lived in all my life and for some reason it felt like it had been forever since I had seen it, when it had really only been a week.

I stood there, looking at it, taking a deep breath in and letting it out. The last time I was standing here looking at my house I was about to set out on an adventure across the country, feeling nervous about going so far from home and now here I was, feeling like a completely different person. How could so much change in just one week?

"Meow." The neighborhood tomcat that I called Gus purred and rubbed against my leg like he was welcoming me home. I bent down and gave him a scratch and a smile before making my way up the sidewalk. I looked at my black 1998 Honda Civic two door coupe. It was a rude awakening to come back to that dinged up jalopy after riding around in a Lamborghini and a stretched Porsche limo all week.

"Hello old girl," I said to my car, giving the hood a pat as I walked by, opening my front door and dragging my heavy suitcase in behind me.

"AAAAAHHHHHHH! YOU'RE HOME!" I heard Ellie scream and bolt off the couch to give me the tightest hug of my life, her dark auburn hair getting into my face as I hugged her.

I pulled back and looked into her green eyes and smooth, tan face dotted with freckles and laughed. "It's good to see you too Ellie. Did you miss me?"

"Yes!" she squealed loudly. "Oh my gosh. I've been dying for you to come home so you can fill me in on ALL the details. I want to know everything!"

"Is my Dad home?" I asked, looking around.

"No. The coast is clear. He's at the library. Now spill," she demanded, grabbing my suitcase and lugging it upstairs for me. Even though I was two inches taller she was definitely stronger than me. I followed her up to my room and unzipped the suitcase and started hanging my clothes up on hangers in my cramped little closet. They were all clean because Dylan's housekeeper Rita had insisted on doing all my laundry before I left. She's such a sweetheart.

Ellie flopped onto my bed that was covered in a million pillows and said, "Sooooo! Why'd you decide to come home a day early? Did something happen?"

"Yeah," I said with a sigh. "A LOT happened. I don't even know where to start," I said, grabbing my shoes and putting them away in the shoe rack.

"Focus woman! I need details!" she shouted, with a laugh. "You're killing me here."

I plopped down onto the bed and let out an exhale, grabbing my stuffed giraffe and clutching it to my chest.

"Well, Dylan is ........ Dylan is," I started to say, suddenly feeling a pull at my heart from saying his name out loud. My eyes started burning and filling with tears.

"Bren, what's wrong?" Ellie asked, scooting over and pulling me into a hug as I cried into my hands. She rubbed on my back and asked, "Did something happen? Did he hurt you?" She pulled back and looked into my face. "If he hurt you, I swear to all that is holy that I will get on a plane and fly there right now and kick his ass. Don't think for a second I won't."

I laughed as I pictured that and sniffled, looking at my best friend with watery eyes.

"You, a little 5'4 string bean would try to kick 6'2 Dylan Chase's ass? The guy that's jacked with muscles like Superman? That I would pay to see," I laughed, wiping my tears.

"Well I would sure as hell try if he hurt my best friend," she said. "So do I need to book a flight to L.A. and get my can of whoop ass ready?"

Then my smile faded and I let out another exhale. "No, he didn't hurt me. He's amazing," I sighed, sinking back into my piles of pillows again and sniffling.

"I thought since he's a celebrity he was going to be arrogant and full of himself and thoughtless and rude. I thought spending a week with him was going to be absolute torture," I said, with my bottom lip starting to tremble again as I hugged my giraffe to my chest. "But it wasn't. It was the most incredible week of my life," I cried.

Ellie looked like she was thinking for a second and then her jaw dropped and she looked at me with wide eyes. "Did you have sex with him?!"

I looked down at my giraffe, picking at his fur and avoiding making eye contact.

She gasped. "You did!" she said, smacking my arm. She sat there with her jaw hanging open, shaking her head in disbelief with wide eyes. "Wow. I can't believe you had sex with Dylan Chase," she said in awe.

"I know. You don't have to tell me how stupid I am for sleeping with a guy I know I can't have because I already know. That's not even the stupidest part though," I said, burying my face in my stuffed animal.

"What do you mean? What else did you do?" she asked, pulling it away from my face and looking at me, waiting for an answer.

I took a breath in and let out a long exhale, looking down at my hands before saying, "He asked me to stay in California and be his girlfriend. He asked me to move into his huge mansion with him."

Her jaw dropped again. "What! That's amazing! Why do you think that's stupid?"

"The stupid part is ........ I told him no," I said softly, with my eyes filling up with tears.

She studied my face, looking confused.

"You told him no?" she repeated, looking at me like I had three heads. "Let me get this straight. Dylan Chase, THE Dylan Chase, the fucking sexiest man alive asked you to be his girlfriend and move in with him? And you told him no?" she asked, staring at me like I was the biggest idiot she ever met.

"Yeah," I said painfully, letting out an exhale and looking back down at my hands. "My whole life is in Iowa. I can't leave Dad here alone. I'm all he has and you're here, and I'm about to finish school and I want to buy a house and open up my own coffee shop here. I can't just leave my whole life, everyone I know and all my dreams behind and move to Hollywood for a guy. I don't even like Hollywood! In fact I hate the people there and the whole environment," I told her. "And he's stuck there because of his career."

She nodded her head but she didn't look convinced.

"I know telling him no was the right thing to do," I said sadly. "So why do I feel so shitty about it?"

She looked at me and gave me a sympathetic half smile. "I don't know Brenley. You tell me," she said softly.

I sat there, thinking about it and the answer finally came to me and my lip started to tremble again. I choked out the words, "Because I love him," as I started to cry. I buried my face in my giraffe again and sobbed as she put an arm around me and rubbed my back to comfort me. It was the first time I had said that about a guy since my ex from high school, four years ago.

After a minute I raised my tear streaked face to look over at her.

"You love him Bren?" she asked softly. "You only spent a week with him."

"I know," I said, letting out a sigh and staring off into the distance. "But I was with him pretty much all day every day and we had a lot of long talks. It was long enough to fall in love."

We both sat there in silence for a minute and I looked down at my hands, picking at my nails. "But his life is there and my life is here. It's like that old saying. A bird may love a fish but where would they live?"

She looked sad as she sat there thinking all of this over.

"I'm really sorry Bren. I can't even imagine how hard it must have been to turn him down."

"Yeah," I said with an exhale. "It was the hardest thing I've ever done. I'll get over it eventually I'm sure," I said, staring off into the distance and zoning out.

"Hey," she said, turning my head towards her to break me from the trance I was under. "I know what we need to do. You need to come over to my house and we're going to make the messiest ice cream sundaes, get drunk off our asses, give each other drunken makeovers and sing karaoke, really loud and really bad karaoke."

I gave her a forced smile and said, "That sounds nice." She always knew how to cheer me up but I knew even she couldn't cheer me up this time.

Oops I did it again. I played with your heart. Got lost in the game! Oooh baby baby!we both sang loudly and when the song was over we both collapsed on the couch laughing.

"Did I hear some dying cats down here?" Ellie's twin brother Spencer asked, coming around the corner and we both threw pillows at him at the same time.

He plopped down in the middle of the couch between us and looked over at me. He had dark auburn hair, tan skin with freckles and green eyes like his sister. "So how did your week with Dylan Chase go?"

Ellie elbowed him in the side and whispered, "Not the time Spence," bugging her eyes out at him, trying to give him a clue.

"What?" Spencer asked. "Why can't I talk about it? Did you ride in his Lamborghini?"

"Even better," I said, feeling the full effects of the margaritas we drank earlier. "I got to drive it."

"Shit! I would kill to drive a car like that. That's bad ass. What else did you do?"

"Oh, let me see," I sighed, drunkenly counting the things off on my fingers. "I went to a movie premiere and met a whole bunch of famous people, went shopping on rodeo drive, went to some fancy restaurants, had a pool party with a bunch of people from some popular TV show but I can't remember the name of it, shot a movie," I laughed and then hiccuped and that made Ellie giggle. "Oh, and I did some other stuff that I can't tell you about Spencer, because if I did I'd have to kill you."

"Oh yeah? Like what?" Spencer laughed.

"Like having sex with Dylaaaaaan Chaaaaaaaase!" Ellie laughed and I gasped and reached across Spencer to smack her with a couch pillow.

"Ellie! What the hell!" I yelled. "That was supposed to be a secret! You weren't supposed to tell anybody!"

"Hey! I can't keep secrets from my twin. Especially not when I'm drunk off my ass. You know this," she laughed.

Spencer smiled and shrugged. "She's right. I always know when she's keeping a secret and I get it out of her. You know this Bren. You've known us for how many years? Ten?"

I sat there in silence getting a far off look on my face with my head spinning from the alcohol.

"I can't believe you had sex with Dylan Chase," he laughed, holding up my hand and giving it a high five.

I shook my head and said, 'No, no, no. No one's supposed to know about that. You can't tell anybody Spencer. You two have to swear you won't tell anybody else. Promise!"

"We promise," Ellie nodded, crossing her heart. She looked over at me and asked, " So how was it?"

I laid back on the couch, letting out an exhale and looking up at the ceiling. A small smile slowly crept across my face and I said, "It was frickin' amazing."

Ellie got a smile on her face too and squealed, "I knew it would be. Damn I'm jealous."

"So am I," Spencer said, and we all three started to laugh our asses off because he's straight.